May 2009

Entrepreneurship is unique in that it encompasses and concentrates all areas of business into one entity, a stool in this case. Additionally, a business grows much like a person. Except, in most cases you want your business to grow fat.

That fat person resides on your entrepreneurial stool and it’s your responsibility to make sure it doesn’t collapse.

What happens every time a company makes a mistake or gets called out on something? We see a press release or statement sent out that addresses the matter and tries to put it to rest. These press releases are structured, proof read 100 times and simply look insincere.

In the first week of the Summer 2009 JuniorBiz Project Charter traffic to my site increased 77% from 168 to 298 visitors. At this rate I will have over 280,000 weekly visitors by the end of the 13-week project charter. Probably not possible but it is a good start to the summer.

I implemented two new strategies this week to increase my traffic; guest post and Digg shouts.

Contrary to popular belief, marketing is not synonymous with advertising. In fact, advertising and promotion only constitutes 25% of the marketing mix. So what makes up the other 75% of marketing?

Product, price and place. Coincidentally, they all start with the letter ‘P.’ As an example I will use a hippopotamus-selling company.

Here’s the scenario: You are the marketing manager of Hippos Direct, Inc., a company that raised and now wants to sell hippopotami (the seldom used plural of hippopotamus; hippopotamuses is also correct) to zoos around the world. It is your job to develop a marketing plan for how you should go about selling the hippopotami. The basis for your marketing plan is the marketing mix, also referred to as the “4 P’s of Marketing.”